In the past, cheese, such as cheddar or colby, has been manufactured in an open-top vat and after draining of the whey from the vat the curd is cut into slabs or blocks which are hand turned or inverted and stacked to drain the residual whey from the slabs. Subsequently, the curd slabs are transferred to a curd mill where they are cut into cube-shaped chunks, and the chunks are transferred to hoops or drums for pressing and aging.
The conventional process of manually cutting and matting the curd slabs requires considerable labor, and as the curd slabs are exposed during the matting process there is a possibility of contamination of the curd by outside materials.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,636,630 describes a continuous process of cheese making in which a mixture of curds and whey is deposited on an inclined perforated conveyor which acts to separate the whey from the curd and discharges the curd upon the uppermost of two non-porous endless belt conveyors. As the curd moves over the uppermost conveyor, it is matted and the curd mat is transferred to the lower conveyor, and in doing so, is inverted. As the mat of curd is discharged from the lower conveyor, a guillotine knife cuts the mat into strips, and the strips are then conveyed to a curd milling machines where it is milled into cube-like chunks.